A crunchy mama, a geeky papa, a minion, and an -inator

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The minion is right in the stage where everything goes in her mouth. She also loves animals, anytime the pavlovinator is anywhere she can see, she desperately tries to get to her. If she does she pets and then sticks her hands in her mouth. I don’t have much of a problem with her doing this with our clean, healthy, indoor cat. Goats however, I’m a little more wary. We went to Zoo Atlanta a few days ago and we knew there was a petting zoo before we went. We thought that if we let the minion pet the goats there, we would want to wash her hands afterwards and the zoo would probably either provide industrial soap or alcohol based hand sanitizer. Neither of which we wanted to put on our daughter’s skin, much less have end up in her mouth.

My solution was to make ‘crunchy’ hand sanitizer before we went. I dissected an aloe vera leaf for the first time, a messy but very fun experience, and scraped the juice out. If you use a leaf instead of buying the juice on its own, put a towel down under your workspace.

The variety of essential oils in this recipe give it antibacterial, antiviral, antiseptic, and antifungal properties. The vitamin E oil and aloe vera are good for your skin. The witch hazel includes 14% rubbing alcohol to kill microbes. You can substitute other essential oils for the clove and eucalyptus oils, it was mainly what I had on hand. Lavender, rosemary, sage, and/or peppermint essential oils could also be used and probably many more that I just don’t know of.

‘Crunchy’ Hand Sanitizer

1 cup aloe vera juice

1 Tablespoon witch hazel

3 drops vitamin E oil (optional but extends shelf life to 6 months)

30 drops tea tree essential oil

5 drops clove essential oil

5 drops eucalyptus essential oil

Mix everything together in a sealable container. Shake well before each use as oils will separate. It goes on very slimy but will evaporate/sink into your skin in a few seconds of rubbing.

The minion loved petting the goats and the rest of the zoo. Here’s a picture of some of the goats cuddling up.